Unearthly (Imperial India Pale Ale)Southern Tier Brewing Company

Look

Smell

Taste

Feel

Overall

Review (optional)

0 characters.
We love reviews! Turn your rating into one with ≥ 150 characters. Awesome. Thanks for the review!

Explain why you're giving this rating. Your review must discuss the beer's attributes (look, smell, taste, feel) and your overall impression in order to indicate that you have legitimately tried the beer. Nonconstructive reviews may be removed without notice and action may be taken on your account.

From a 12 oz bottle.
Deep amber body topped by an exceptional off-white head.
Mild, balanced and easy drinking for style ... Not quite like an APA, however, as the bitterness and hop flavor builds with tasting.
Medium body and carbonation.

Bottle dated DOB 03/01/16 into pint glass. Pours a clear golden amber with an eggshell-white head. Initial impression is some citrus bitterness up front, well balanced by caramel malt sweetness. Medium mouthfeel - a little syrupy for the style, but not objectionable at all. Quite smooth. Alcohol is well hidden. Finish is in keeping with the citrus/malt profile. Very drinkable.

Chill hazed deep amber colored ale the color of tarnished copper. Good off-white colored head with a distinct yellowish tinge.

The smell is mostly strong pine and woody hops. Quite sweet smelling with one of the strongest pineapple aroma I have ever smelled in a beer. Lots of hops and aromas of pine and pineapple, orange, limoncello, tea, oak and menthol.

The taste starts out sweet and fruity with a pineapple and tea flavor. Interesting this tastes more fruity than hoppy and compares very well with top of the line IIPAs. Pine and grapefruit hop flavors are very much tamed to allow the fruit and tea flavors to come out fully in this beer. Peach and pineapple are the strongest fruit flavors but not the only ones.

Mouthfeel is quite thick.

Incredibly easy to drink and dangerous too at 11%. A beer you would love to drink all day it is that good. This beer compares favorably with Dreadnaught and the two Pliny's and is right up there with those three beers. Highly recommended for all hopheads.

This beer in a bomber bottle was a gift. I hadn't seen it before, so who knows where my buddy got it from. Oh, I know.. from Beer Heaven. Wow(!) what a beer.

It poured in a cross between bronze and orange. With a very nice head. Later offering a nice crusty lace. Lace is always a sign of a good (great) beer.

One smell says it all. Fantastic. What IS this concoction my beer buddy has wrought upon me? A nice combination of many hops and a brown sugar smell.

With all the hops there is a distinct bitter taste, yet that is tempered by a nice malt flavor that somehow balances it all out. As one reviewer already wrote, "with so many hops they must have added several fields worth of barley to balance it all out." Because it is great tasting.

The mouthfeel was good but not great. So much bite can twist your buds around a bit.

Drinkability is good. The hold-back is that it is SO intense who can drink more than one bottle? It's not like grabbing for another Natty Lite or something like that, after all. In fact you need another lighter beer as a sort of chaser. All of which is fine and good.

T: Hops hit the tongue first with a nice fruity flavour. hop bitterness follows with a bit of alcohol warmth, surprisingly mild in terms of alcohol considering it's 11% actually. Toasted grains come in with a sweetness that lingers and blends with a bitter hop finish. Beautiful balance on display here, not too bitter and not too sweet, just huge flavours working together.

M: soft and smooth, medium body with just enough carbonation to bring out all the flavours

D: No doubt this beer packs a wallop, and it'll almost certainly tire out my taste buds. not much use switching to another beer afterwards either since next to this it'll taste like water.

pours a nice crystal clear golden color with a white head that recedes to a thin lace. the aroma is a beautiful arrangement of hops and fruit esters balanced out nicely over a background of malt. the taste follows suite with a nice bit of the malt up front and the fruity hoppy follow through with a good hop bite at the end. the mouthfeel is a little thinner than the other double ipa's I've had this afternoon, but still very nice with good bit of carbonation.

A: Copper color, very clear. No head or very little. Sticky 'tho. I would prefer more head. Maybe my pour was less than good.
S: wow, a very strong aroma. I could smell this beer without my nose being close to the glass. I get mainly hops, resinous and some grapefruit. I notice the alchohol.
T: Bitter in a strange, but good, way. I notice the hops but also the alchohol. Some notes of caramel, yeah caramel first then it has a bitter finish. Very well done.
M: Full bodied beer and very complex. Harmonious in the mouth.
D: Awesome for this kind of beer... and dangerously since it is 11%.

Taste - Ive had this beer many times, finally sitting down and drinking it and reviewing. Starts off very malty and hoppy. Sweet citrus and plenty of booze. Carmael malts add a thick boldness, and some spice. I get some hop juice in there also. Intense.

Mouthfeel - A monster, a wrecker, and dominator. Mouth gets sweetned, bittered then warmed. Everything you could ask for in a beer.

Drinkabilty - High but be careful its 11%. Strong hop and malt heavy, a great balance for a double ipa. A real treat, not something to drink daily but once a month i tend to go un-earthy. World class.

S - Very strong malt bill on this one. A bit caramelly. Citrus hops are taking the back seat here.

T - It's really tough to decide which is the more predominant flavor. And they're not living in balance. The malt and hops seem to be battling it out. They say that there are no winners in war but obviously that's wrong. We are the winners.

Bottle received as a kickin' extra from calise1122 in a recent trade. Thanks, Brett!

No date on the bottle.

Poured into my goblet. Pours a hazy amber/orange with an inch's worth of off-white head on top. Dissipates to just a ring around the edge. Leaves plenty of gorgeous sticky lace on the glass. The scent is a little underwhelming. Smells sweet, but the big hoppy citrus punch I expect is absent. In its place is a sweet graham cracker, brown sugar, molasses scent. Some light pine on the finish.

The mouth is slightly syrupy. Mild carbonation on the tongue. For the multiple hops used in this beer, and in what forms they were used, I am also a little underwhelmed by the flavor. Some light citrus tones at the onset, but very low bitterness. The sweetness continues here as well. Lots of caramel and toffee in this beer. Mild bitter finish, but it fades quickly.

Huh. I'm going to assume that this bottle had some age on it. Please regard this review as such. All in all, a good beer for sure, but just shadows of what I think it is meant to be. I would love to try a fresh bottle and compare my findings. For all I know this IS a fresh bottle. Still, I'd recommend this beer.

I indulged in this beer at a local brewpub, on the beach on a hot summer afternoon. I was on vacation and had consumed several rum drinks by the ocean earlier in the day, so my girlfriend and I ventured into this bar during our wait before dinner. At the bar i drank 2 or 3 other high gravity brews before i rounded up enough courage to step up to the Unearthly... I drank the 22oz. bottle and needless to say me and my girlfriend missed our reservation. This beer offered a drunk unlike anything i had ever experienced, I literally felt like i was tripping on a drug from the 70s. When i woke i was nude in my hotel room, so needless to say i traveled back to this bar and purchased several more Unearthly bottles to go. I absolutely love this beer, no other Imperial IPA has topped my personal beer list.